


Oh, Hello, It's You

by allineedisaquill



Series: PatCap Prompts [5]
Category: Ghosts (TV 2019)
Genre: Developing Friendships, Developing Relationship, First Meetings, Introspection, M/M, Pining, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 02:42:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28699347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allineedisaquill/pseuds/allineedisaquill
Summary: Pat recalls the day that he met the Captain and how he has always set him apart.For my PatCap prompt series. Prompt: "It's pathetic, I knew I did it from that first moment we met. It was...not love at first sight exactly, but - familiarity. Like: oh, hello, it's you. It's going to be you. Game over."
Relationships: Pat Butcher/The Captain (Ghosts TV 2019)
Series: PatCap Prompts [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2087646
Comments: 6
Kudos: 68





	Oh, Hello, It's You

**Author's Note:**

> I'm taking prompts over on my Tumblr (patcaps) so send one in and I might just write it!

It wasn’t love at first sight - and even the self-proclaimed romantic in Pat would admit to that - but Pat had set the Captain apart from the moment they met.

The Captain had been the first, that fateful day. It was sealed from then.

“A smooth transition is key, we don’t want to overwhelm the poor man.” Pat had heard his stern voice from beyond the vehicle and assumed it belonged to medical staff. It was fast even for an ambulance, but Pat hadn’t known how much time had passed. It was only when he saw a man in military dress step onboard the smoking bus that he realised his time with the living was over, and everything he thought he knew slipped away without grace or forgiveness.

It had taken all his effort not to pass out, or scream, or run away.

Instead, he’d calmly risen from the driver’s seat and followed him.

He’d been too numb to speak, but the man - the Captain, he learned - did all the talking for him. From the lay of the land to both what and who awaited him at the house, the Captain filled him in, and Pat had simply nodded where it was required.

He did, however, cling to the stranger’s voice like a buoy in a storm. It reminded him of people he’d once known, a soothing depth and concise pattern that was easy for him to follow safely to shore. He had nothing else, nothing but the clothes on his back, but he did have the Captain’s steady presence at his side. 

He followed the invisible pull in his chest without hesitation. He always had.

The Captain walked with him through the large house. Pat noted how it had been nothing but interesting and quite beautiful when he was alive and telling his lads about it, but the idea of an indefinite amount of time stuck in its long corridors and haunted, age-worn rooms was terrifying. He hadn’t even wanted to imagine how especially lonely the nights would be, how impossibly bigger and more daunting the house would feel.

They stopped outside a room. “Ah, this is you. There are a few other rooms should you not find it suitable, but this one is in the best shape. It is an old house, after all,” the Captain said. He rocked on his heels and smiled tightly.

Pat couldn’t find it in him to smile, but he did tilt his head. “Is it really just ‘Captain’? There’s nothing else I can call you?” He asked quietly.

He was met with a squint and a furrowed brow. “Is there a problem?”

“No, no,” he backtracked, hands raised in surrender. “Captain it is.” It sounded harsh and authoritative on Pat’s tongue, but Pat supposed that’s what the Captain was going for. Pat wasn't so sure it suited him; there was something that lurked beneath the Captain's deep waters, something more tender that ought to have a name to match it.

“Good,” the Captain said, soundly interrupting that thought. “Now, I suggest you get yourself settled. There’s a briefing at eighteen hundred hours in the common room - large room upstairs, the one I showed you. Tardiness isn’t typically appreciated and Lady Button will let you know it, but I’ll forgive your absence if you don’t feel up to it today. I can brief the others without you there, but should you wish to introduce yourself… Well, there’s your window.” 

“Right,” Pat said, followed by a thick swallow. Everything was still sinking in. His hands, lost for something else to occupy them, fiddled with the hem of his necker.

The Captain had been poised ready to make his retreat, but he paused and gave a short sigh. “Can I give you a few words of advice, Patrick?”

Pat laughed despite himself. “It’s Pat,” he corrected, though by the way the Captain simply raised an eyebrow at him impatiently, he knew there was a 50/50 chance of that being permanently adhered to. “Go on?”

He watched the Captain blink, and then the stern exterior that had been unshifting and stubborn softened before him. The older man inclined his head toward him, and the way the fat gathered beneath his chin was...almost endearing, Pat thought. 

“Throw yourself in headfirst; I found it better to acclimatise to this new life quickly. You can let each day pass you by slowly, in agony, or you can dust yourself off and see what there is to be done.”

“‘Be done’? We’re _dead._ What is there to be done?” Pat asked confusedly, with just a tiny bite of annoyance that slipped through the veil of grief.

The Captain gave a short laugh of his own, gentle and genuine. “With this lot, there’s always something, trust me - and from the cut of you, I’d wager you have quite a lot to bring to the table.”

Pat wasn’t convinced, but the hint of a compliment did something to permeate the heaviness that weighed upon him. Warmed through, he straightened his shoulders and nodded. His smile, while small, was as good a start as any.

“I suppose I’ll see you at six, then.”

“Good man,” the Captain said, pleased, before he turned on his heel and left with his swagger stick tucked neatly under his arm.

The day Pat stood and watched the plague ghosts reconcile after their spat, the Captain standing beside him within arm’s reach, he thought about that first day.

The Captain had afforded him patience that Pat had later come to realise was not something he did often. He’d been _kind,_ and had seen something in him when Pat was all but lost. Pat knew, down to the marrow, that the Captain was a kindred spirit even if they didn’t always see eye to eye. They understood each other more than most of the others, and the Captain’s steadfast presence was more often a comfort than it was a nuisance. He would sooner seek it out than he would ever turn it away, and it had become the simple truth long ago, back when they were still Patrick and the Captain instead of Pat and Cap.

Too uncomfortable with the guilt in the face of forgiveness, Pat glanced at the Captain’s face and found his brow furrowed in that achingly familiar way, the way he had memorised just as he had memorised the rooms of Button House. In that single glance, all lingering anger flooded from him like water down a drain. He knew, after all, that he would always have room for sorry, for forgiveness, for the same patience he’d been met with all those years ago.

When it came down to it, it would always be _them._ It would be them when their next problem arose, when the next thing that needed to be done was added to the unending list (the Captain had been right about that), when he next needed to follow the Captain into battle - he gladly would, just as gladly as he’d sit by him in silence. 

It wasn’t love at first sight, but it was love all the same.


End file.
